'Rice,' 'sorghum,' 'pearl millet' and 'finger millet' in Nilo-Saharan

This study overviews the geographical distribution of the terms for four major types of crops cultivated in Africa, ‘rice,’ ‘sorghum,’ ‘pearl millet’ and ‘finger millet’ in Nilo-Saharan languages. Most Nilo-Saharan languages lack a native term for ‘rice,’ but a number of languages attest a loanword from Arabic or Swahili. On the other hand, these languages attest a (possibly) native terms for ‘sorghum,’ ‘pearl millet’ and ‘finger millet,’ and we will analyze them by heuristically reconstructing proto-forms.